In retrospect, Jonathan Wener must be relieved he stayed in Montreal the city he loves with the accumulated passion of six generations that preceded him – when first the political and later the development climate in Quebec changed as he was growing into the industry.

Not that he wasn’t tempted, but if he had left for Toronto for example, he probably wouldn’t today be presiding over the reincarnation of the Montreal Forum.

When the Forum Entertainment Centre opens in 1999 it will be "Canada’s largest urban entertainment centre" anchored by the "world’s largest multiplex cinema". Those kinds of opportunities don’t often surface and Canderel was in the right place at the right time.

Montreal, where Wener was born and nurtured his fascination with real estate development, has a powerful hold on him. Even has a teenaged student at Sir George Williams University, he worked between semesters as a labourer and then as a tenant improvement contractor for two construction firms before graduating with a Bachelor of Commerce degree in 1971.

Fortuitously for Wener, he was swept along with those former employers when they were clasped into the corporate embrace of Trizec Corporation, then headquartered in Montreal, the following year. Trizec turned out to be a less than perfect fit but a great credential; after a year and a half he decamped for office building developer First Quebec Corporation, as vice-president, leasing and developments.

He was a mere 23-year old, a developer wunderkind whose career was on a fast track, in an n industry with a high kill ratio for those lacking in the smarts, stamina, patience and nerves of steel. It was also the last time Wener was to work for someone else. He had incorporated Canderel (a contraction of Canadian Developers of Real Estate) while holding interests in First Quebec ventures.

By the time he threw his youthful, and still legendary, energies into Canderel full time in 1980, the company’s portfolio was nudging $1 million. In less than 10 years the portfolio was swollen to more than 40 projects worth more than $400 million. From 1990 to 1997, most of its activities focused on building Trilogy Development Corporation with his partner John Evans in Whistler and Vancouver.

Wener is C.E.O. of Canderel and chairman of the Canderel group of Companies, which include a 50% per cent interest in Trilogy and Stoneridge Development Corporation, Toronto among other business associations and affiliated companies. The group is carving out a budding empire in the office, commercial and industrial markets – with property/asset management, construction/development and promotional/marketing services – in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver.

Some of their most recent projects are:

But for sheer, Hollywood-style glitz, development glamour and instant celebrity for Canderel, nothing can touch its forthcoming $70 million Forum Entertainment Centre, with about 70 per cent of the nearly 300,00 sqft of leasable space taken by signed leases or offers.

The main players are AMC Theatres of Canada (AMC), which will build a 7,250- seat, 30-screen multiplex; Showmix Inc. a California-based company which builds 70mm format theatres, will put in a 450-seat theatre in 36,00 sq.ft; and Rainforest Café will create a two storey restaurant and retail store in 15,00 sq.ft.

Canderel had researched the potential in the entertainment field when the Molson family, who owned the 74-year old building, ventured several possibilities.

Wener and his colleagues weren’t exactly bowled over, but they were intrigued by other possibilities. While the building doesn’t have any architectural merit, it has " a great soul and a great past. We became passionate about reclaiming it for the city, particularly in a neighbourhood that had been badly hurt by the recession and the Forum closing", recall Wener.

The Canderel team was dazzled by the location, track record and demographics. Moreover, 70 percent of those audiences were delivered by subway and the 13-bus terminal across the street. Exits off two main highways are a few blocks away. Some 70,000 students within 10 city blocks, the highest density of residential population and the Westmount neighbourhood, with the highest disposable income in Montreal, are also nearby.

"The three levels of government have been extremely helpful and the City of Montreal has made tremendous investment in planning, landscaping and redevelopment of the immediate area, with a new boulevard, lighting and other improvements". Properties in the area are already being snapped up by anticipation of a Forum-inspired revival of the once bustling neighbourhood feeding off the arena’s events.

In the meantime, he tirelessly logs frequent flights across the country as Canderel development family keeps expanding its presence in the hotter markets across the country. Wener seems to thrive on that hectic pace, but if it starts to get him physically, he can always turn to his wife, and alternative care practitioner, to recommend effective remedies for stress and fatigue.

Their 22-year old daughter seems to have caught that bug, having gone off to San Francisco for a four-year post-graduate course in Chinese medicine and holistic therapies. Another daughter, 20, is at the University of Victoria taking environmental studies, and their 17-year old daughter has aspirations to become a lawyer.

Wener, an affable, accessible and extremely able developers’ developer, is very much the family man, at work as well. Most of the nearly 200 people that work for him have been with the family for years, through good times and bad.

"The most difficult thing I’ve had to do was to close our Toronto office temporarily and thin out the organization in 1989 before the market star3ted to collapse, but I was able to find jobs for them outside the company. Our greatest strength today is the quality of the team".